The original comment expressly states a "non-scaling" version of twitter...what is so hard about that? this sub=thread then clearly illustrates what "non-scaling" means and doesn't mean. smh
The poster was stating that writing Twitter was easy, anyone can do it, the only thing Twitter really has going for it are the network effects of having a huge user base and lots of visibility.
I do think that Twitter's biggest asset are the network effects that it currently enjoys, but I don't think that it would be trivial to recreate what they've done in order to create a Twitter competitor. It's not insurmountable, but it's not trivial either.
The original comment was clearly meant to trivialize the engineering. "One guy can do it in a weekend" is hyperbole, it's something you say when you're trying to communicate that anyone can do something in a relatively short amount of time. If there are a bunch of downvotes I would assume they're more for the hyperbole than people actually disagreeing with whether or not one weekend is enough time to write "non-scaling Twitter", which isn't specific enough for anyone to argue about how long it would take to do.
I don't think copying Twitter as a whole is easy nor do I think just anyone can do it. As pointed out, a simple non-scaling version of Twitter could be done by a competent developer in a weekend. I'm a front-end developer and I feel confident I could do it, just not in a weekend.
I fail to see where I am dismissing the accomplishments of the Twitter engineers in pointing out that creating, what is essentially, a RSS feed with a 140 character limit over a weekend would be difficult.
I believe you are complaining over something no one has stated.
I do think that Twitter's biggest asset are the network effects that it currently enjoys, but I don't think that it would be trivial to recreate what they've done in order to create a Twitter competitor. It's not insurmountable, but it's not trivial either.
The original comment was clearly meant to trivialize the engineering. "One guy can do it in a weekend" is hyperbole, it's something you say when you're trying to communicate that anyone can do something in a relatively short amount of time. If there are a bunch of downvotes I would assume they're more for the hyperbole than people actually disagreeing with whether or not one weekend is enough time to write "non-scaling Twitter", which isn't specific enough for anyone to argue about how long it would take to do.